Baby Goats Have Arrived

Finally!  The first of our 2011 new kids were born yesterday afternoon to Alure, one of our purebred Nubian goats.  She had two boys and a girl.  We thought she would have three this year as she was so big.  Our vet checked her out about a month ago and just looking at her said "triplets".

Rain is the kid nearest the wall - the first born with his brother Storm

Our weather has been extremely wet for our standards here in the Rain Shadow of the Olympic Mountains.  We normally receive between 17 and 20 inches of rain each year, a "rain year" running November through October.  Since November we have already had 17 inches of rain at our farm.  Since last Thursday we have had 2.5 inches.  Large puddles and streams have appeared on our farm where I have never seen them before.  It's raining right now and showers are in the forecast for the week.

Alure licking off her little girl, Windy

I have always been the one in our family delivering the baby goats but yesterday afternoon I had real estate showings to do so Pam was the one home.  We knew Alure was due (actually two days past the normal 150 days expected) so we had Alure in a separate "birthing room."  When Pam was finished with her barn chores this afternoon she did a final check on Alure before going into the house and saw the big bubble.  This is a long, clear string of "goob" (mucous) hanging from the doe's vagina.  If the goop is amber, it is amniotic fluid, and a sure sign that kidding should happen very soon.  The first one out was a boy, soon named Rain.  After birthing is the time to assist the kids in finding the teats. This can sometimes be extremely frustrating. The kids just don't seem to "get it". We always need to hold the teats for them at first as we want to make sure they get their colostrum (first milk) as soon as possible. The kids really must get their colostrum within 1 hour of birth.  To be sure they get this colostrum I put some in a bottle and feed the kid.

Pharaoh the barn cat had to come down from the loft to check out all the activity 

 Colostrum is the thick, yellow fluid which is produced before the mother's milk comes in.  It is nature's way of transferring immune factors from mother to baby and generally occurs in the first two days after birthing.  Last year one of our does had way more colostrum than her kids could use so I made yogurt with a gallon of it.  Unbelievably good!

Storm, the second boy born, is still wet and about an hour old

I talked to Pam on the phone when I was completed with my showings and she told me of her first assisted birth.  When I got home about an hour later we had another boy and a little girl.  The boy was named Storm and the girl Windy.

Mothers can be such a pest, with their constant licking of the new born.  This boy looks just like his father, Snowshoe.

I made sure everyone got several ounces of colostrum, were dried off and warm (we have two heat lamps in the birthing room) and came to the house for dinner.  After dinner and our evening walk with the dogs, I again fed the kids and gave them each a shot of Bovi Sera, an antibody concentrate for newborns.  I got up at 1 am to feed everyone again (and haven't been back to sleep yet).  Once I observe them feeding on their mother most of my work will be done, but with triplets we will continue to supplement their feeds with bottle milk.

Surely was due last month but it seems her breeding never took.  That is a real disappointment for us as Surely has always been our best milker.  Nettle is due May 1 and she is also a great milker - we are crossing our fingers that she is pregnant.  Next year we are going to build a breeding pen with a shelter where we will lock the girl in with the buck we want to breed for a month to be sure it takes.  Oh well, it might be a lean year for us with goat milk as Alure, though a great mother, is not very good as a milker.